“You touched nothing?”
“I’m sure we didn’t. Only the pan on the stove and me ’usband felt Miss Fitzpayne’s pulse to see if she was dead. Not that ’e knew where ’er pulse was, but he was always one for bein’ a bit clever. He’d read somethin’ about pulses in the paper. She’s dead, I sez to ’im, pulse or no pulse. You can see she is, I says. And she was.”
“I suppose you tidied the drawers in the rooms when you cleaned up …?”
“Yes.”
For the first time she gave him a suspicious look. His tact in testing her inquisitiveness was wasted.
“You knew what was in all the drawers?”
“Yes. After tidyin’ ’em for nearly three years. I’m not a busy interferin’ sort, but you can’t ’elp noticin’ …”
“Any letters?”
“No. She never seemed to get much in the way of letters. A bill or two in connection with ’er horses, circulars and leaflets, electricity accounts. She’d some nice clothes, too. Always kept ’erself well dressed and neat. Liked the best of everythin’. Not many, but good, includin’ underwear. All of the best.”
Mrs. Chettle fascinated Littlejohn. Downstairs, he could hear them coming and going. Chettle had gone out for a drink with a reporter who said he had a bottle in his hotel bedroom. Herle was pacing up and down, sneezing and blowing his nose, impatiently waiting for Littlejohn. Cromwell, whose footsteps were recognisable on the stairs, was presumably calling on the two other tenants, for the colonel on the first floor, evidently an elderly man who spoke with a plum in his mouth, was politely inviting him in. The Superintendent felt that his interview with Mrs. Chettle would be of much more use.
“Have you any idea who might have killed Miss Fitzpayne?”
“I haven’t. I’d have told you before if I ’ad. Drink up your tea and I’ll pour you some more.”
She swung her legs, which didn’t touch the floor, from her chair, poured more boiling water on the tea in the pot, and then gave him another black brew.
“Had she any relatives?”
“Not that I’d know. Her mother died about two years since. Then Miss Fitzpayne moved in here. That’s all I ever heard of.”
“Her rent? Did she pay you or your husband?”
“No. Greenways, the agents, look after the flats, pay me and me ’usband, and collect the rents for Mr. Checkland, who owns the flats.”
“Does Mr. Checkland ever come round here?”
“Not been since they was tenanted. Leaves it all to the agents.”
“She paid her rent regularly?”
“Yes, I believe so. They all do. If they didn’t we’d soon be hearin’ from Greenways. They’re a hard lot.”
“Try to throw your mind back over the past week or two, Mrs. Chettle. Did anyone out of the ordinary call?”
She sat silent, sipping and blowing on her tea, showing no signs of mental exertion or concentration.
“Yes,” she said at last. “The man from Australier …”
“Who was he?”
“He called after Mr. Bracknell. It was this way, you see. He’d been down to Freake’s Folly and found Mr. Bracknell out. He said he’d passed somebody on the lane, Dan’s Lane that ’ud be, who said he should try ’ere. He was offen here when not at home. Which was jest a bit o’ spite, if you ask me. You’d think he never went out of Freake’s except to come ’ere. Which wasn’t true. You’re not drinkin’ your tea …”
Littlejohn hastily drained his cup and had it filled again.
“Did he give any name?”
“No. ’e was very chary, like, and in a hurry. He kept lookin’ down the stairs, too, as if he didn’t want to be seen. He’d come in a car. I looked out of the landin’ winder when he’d gone and saw him drive off. I told ’im there was neither of ’em in and he might find Mr. Bracknell in the town, perhaps shoppin’, if he cared to look around. But he never. He went off in the direction of Freake’s again, as though intendin’ to wait till Mr. Bracknell got back.”
“You said he was Australian … Did he tell you?”
“No. But he spoke like one. Or that’s what Chettle sez to me after he’d gone. Chettle was sittin’ up here with the door open all the time.”
“Had Mr. Chettle been in Australia, then?”
“No, but ’e was with the Anzacs in the first war. In the Middle East, he was, alongside ’em. He knew a lot of ’em. That’s where he got his back. In the Middle East in the war.”
By the tone of her voice, it might have been the V.C.
“And he recognised his voice?”
“When I got back ’ere, I sez to Chettle, ‘He sounded like a Cockney, or somethin’.’ ‘Get away, missus,’ sez Chettle. ‘Cockney, me foot! He’s Australian.’ An’ Chettle ought to know, oughtn’t he?”
“What kind of a fellow was he?”
“Between fifty and sixty … Not quite as tall as you, sir. Nor as broad. Grey ’air. Blue eyes, because I noticed they was the colour of the tie ’e was wearin’.”
“Excellent. You’re quite a good witness, Mrs. Chettle. Anything else?”
She was enjoying herself now. She put her elbows on the table and her chin in her hands and smiled a tired smile.
“Grey suit … sort o’ flannel …”
“His face? Did he wear glasses?”
“No. Let me see … Wait a minute …”
She closed her eyes and began to talk.
“His nose looked as if it had been broke. It was jest a bit on one side. Plenty of hair; not bald at all. Thickish lips and a square chin with a thing like a dimple in the middle. Heavy dark eyebrows, which made ’is eyes look bluer. That’s all …” She opened her eyes again and looked dreamy until she shook herself and had a good drink of tea.
Littlejohn had taken it all down on the back of an old envelope.
“Excellent! That’s a great help, Mrs. Chettle.”
But she hadn’t finished.
“A funny ear. You know the sort boxers an’ wrestlers get through havin’ ’em twisted or hit …”
“A cauliflower ear! Which side?”
“Let me see. Left … Left, that’s it.”
Littlejohn put his pen and paper away.
“And now, Mrs. Chettle, will you kindly tell me how you come to give me such a good description? It’s almost photographic.”
She hesitated.
“It’s no business of yours … But as you’ve treated me like a proper gentleman, I’ll tell you, if you won’t say anything to anybody else. It’s all over an’ done with and I’ve been punished for me sins …”
By the way she looked at him, he knew.
“You’ve been in prison?”
There was no shame or fear in her face and she gave him a straight look. He couldn’t imagine what she was thinking. Her tired face was perfectly tranquil.
“Yes. I was took for fortune-tellin’. When I was a young girl me father found out I’d got what he used ter call the faculty. I was mediumistic, you see. We went on the halls in a show where he asked me questions and I answered them. Questions from the audience. You know the kind of thing, sir. We were called Mademoiselle Lemont and Partner. My father used to make me work all the hours God sent, practicin’, memorisin’, learnin’ the tricks and clues he’d give me for the answers. One thing he made me learn was memorisin’ faces …”
“What part of the show did that come in?”
“Before my act started, I’d look in the audience from behind the curtain and memorise faces. Then, when the turn came on, I’d be able to say—I was blindfolded, remember—‘the man on the tenth row with a broken nose, grey hair, a cauliflower ear, a blue tie, a dark suit …’ And he’d know who I meant. I’d then tell ’im that he was goin’ to win at the races … or somethin’ such. It pleased people and, likely as not, if they didn’t win, they’d never see us on the stage again or else be sporty and admit they’d been had for a mug. They hadn’t paid me anything, so couldn’t complain. After father died, I set up fortune-t
ellin’. That was where the police got me. I’m a bit out of practice now, not havin’ done anything at it since I came out after two months gaol. You’d better not tell Chettle, though. He knows nothin’ about that part in my past. It’ll give him money-makin’ ideas and I’ll get no peace till I start again.”
Littlejohn thanked her and said it was time for him to go.
“You’ve been a great help, Mrs. Chettle.”
He put a pound note on the table.
“You shouldn’t have bothered, sir. It’s been a pleasure to ’elp you. I hope somethin’ comes of it.”
The money vanished by a feat of prestidigitation. Chettle would never hear of it.
Below, he could hear the door of the bottom flat close after Cromwell had thanked the doctor. Chettle and the reporter were returning. Chettle was talkative and stumbled as he climbed the stairs.
“To think that all this commotion was started by the milk boilin’ over. If I hadn’t smelled it, you might not have found her yet …”
Herle was waiting. He’d been through all the drawers again.
“Not a thing. Not a clue. It’s another mystery.”
Littlejohn gave him the minute description of the Australian visitor who’d impressed Mrs. Chettle.
“Please have this circulated at once to all police stations, ask them to detain a man answering to the details and, if possible, bring him here for questioning. It’s urgent and vital.”
“But where did you get this, sir? It’s so detailed that the man might have given us a photograph, or else been on the spot as you wrote down the particulars.”
“Mrs. Chettle described him.”
Herle’s face was a study.
“It’s incredible. I’ll bet she’s bluffing us.”
“All the same, I wouldn’t risk it. That mental picture tallies with the man who might have followed Bracknell from Australia, perhaps the one who’s been blackmailed and come over here to put an end to it, once and for all. The man who left his pen on the floor of Freake’s Folly.”
Outside, the town was quiet. The clouds had gathered, the moon had gone, and it had started to rain. Puddles of water reflected the street lamps and here and there a belated car slid past, lit up a stretch of shining asphalt, and then vanished, as though in a hurry to get away from the town where murder couldn’t be stopped.
Littlejohn and Cromwell turned up the collars of their coats and crossed to their hotel. They were both wondering whether or not the stranger was sleeping somewhere nearby, or skulking not far from his latest crime, or else hurling hither and thither in his hired car, trying to evade the men who were hunting him down.
9
THE MAN WITH ALL THE ANSWERS
“WHAT’S THIS, Herbert?”
Littlejohn and Cromwell were sitting down to breakfast in the ‘salle à manger’ of the hotel.
Saturday morning. It was the beginning of one of those rare, fine autumn days which remind you of the past summer and revive the holiday feeling all too briefly. The sun was shining and the sky, swept clean by a light wind of the clouds of the night before, looked to have been shampooed. One after another, private motor-coaches and the road-cars of the transport company filled-up with crowds off to Northampton, where Carleton Athletic were playing away. Men wearing scarves and rosettes blazing with the colours of the local team scampered noisily about the square, waving rattles, and one of them was wearing a striped bowler hat and was ringing a bell under a striped umbrella.
Along the front of the Corn Exchange the stalls for the weekly open market had been erected. The stallholders were shouting their wares—vegetables, fruit, cheese, eggs, and a conglomeration of eatables and lengths of cloth of all kinds. Women were jostling for bargains. The scent of fruit, vegetables and cheese filled the air and even entered the hotel.
On Littlejohn’s plate was a visiting-card.
Cuthbert Blower, Mus.Bac., F.R.C.O.
Church of St. Peter,
Carleton Unthank.
Herbert paused in his languid labours. He wore a white coat a size too big for him. He had not yet fully mastered the delicate art of balancing a tray of crockery and food. He slowly lowered his burden on a convenient table, as though to speak with it held aloft would precipitate its contents all over the place. Then, he reverently bent his head over Littlejohn, who caught a scented whiff of cheap brilliantine mixed with the stale cigarette smoke on Herbert’s breath.
“Mr. Blower was ’ere at h’eight-thirty, sir,” he said in what he thought was an educated voice. The aged head-waiter of the Huncote Arms was training him in the profession and Herbert was determined to get on. “He h’asked me to give you that card, sir. There’s a message wrote on the back …”
I have something urgent to communicate. Could you see me at the church at 10.00 a.m. today?—C.B.
The writing was so small and spidery that Littlejohn needed his glasses to make it out.
The Church of St. Peter was almost as large as a cathedral and the upper-ten of Carleton Unthank lived in a close which surrounded it. The incumbent was a suffragan bishop and the organist a man distinguished in execution and composition. When Littlejohn and Cromwell arrived at the church, he was playing Blower in B.
The notes of the full organ surged and bounced around the vast building, out of the door, and into the main street like a river in flood. As you entered the church, it was like swimming against a mighty tide of Blower. It was exactly ten by the great clock, the chimes of which were swamped by the organ. Mr. Blower was obviously ‘playing-in’ the detectives to keep their appointment.
Littlejohn, bewildered by the weight of the diapasons, looked round the church for the keyboard. The organ pipes were set all over the place and the notes came like shots fired from an ambush. There was no sign of the manipulator of this mighty machine. But, Littlejohn grew aware that he was being watched by a single eye reflected in a mirror to the right of the chancel. This solitary unblinking stare was fixed upon him, like that all-seeing eye of God which heads the membership certificates of certain secret societies. The Superintendent nodded at it convivially. The organ ceased and the music seemed to roar out of the building into the street, leaving an almost unbearable silence behind. Mr. Blower appeared.
He was a small, frail man, which made his mastery of the tremendous instrument all the more surprising. His head was almost completely bald except for a fringe of pepper-coloured hair, he wore lozenge-shaped spectacles in gold frames in front of his peering eyes, and his face was shrivelled like a walnut. He was bad on his feet as he walked, presumably from over-much trampling of the organ pedals. Before he could speak to the newcomers, a huge woman, like a featherbed, rose from the choir, seized him like a child taking up a favourite doll, and kissed him.
“Splendid, my love …”
And turning to Cromwell, whom she seemed to claim as a kindred and sympathetic spirit, she informed him that he had just heard the first performance of another new Blower.
The organist obviously enjoyed the embrace and the congratulations. Later, the two detectives were informed that Mrs. Blower, née Huncote-Smythe, had claimed Cuthbert for her own from early days, much against the wishes of her family. It had been a cause célèbre and a grande passion, although to see them together, you would never have believed it.
“Come home as soon as you have transacted your business, my love. And don’t forget to put on your muffler. It’s cold outside.”
With that parting shot, she left them together, released a large boxer dog, which had been tied-up in the north porch and was still howling at Blower in B, and crossed the close to toast the muffins.
“Thank you for calling, Superintendent.”
A most kindly, quiet and cultured voice, almost apologetic.
“I asked you to be good enough to meet me here because I am not on speaking terms with the local police. Last winter when I gave my services at a charity concert and parked my car outside the Public Hall, Herle and his far-from-merry men had me fined two pou
nds for being on the wrong side. After that, I washed my hands of them.”
He washed his hands in thin air to show how he did it and then drew mysteriously near to Littlejohn and whispered to him.
“Come this way, sir …”
He led them a flat-footed way to a spiral staircase behind the keyboards, climbed it nimbly, and they followed. It ended in a loft which, before electric power had been added to the instrument, had been the eyrie of the man who manipulated the bellows. The long pump-handle projected still, in case of emergencies, which were frequent in winter. At times the power consumed by the chilly people of the district attenuated that of the organ to a degree which made manual help necessary to cope with the might of Mr. Blower’s compositions.
The organist switched on a light, revealing a dusty room, with a floor of bare boards. Two tumbledown chairs and a large outcast pew were all the furnishings. Mr. Blower pointed to the floor, which was littered with crumbs and a crust of bread.
“Mice?” said Cromwell.
“Certainly not! I don’t allow mice about my organ.”
He then indicated the old pew, across the seat of which was stretched a long, ecclesiastical-looking red cushion headed by two old hassocks.
“Last night, there was an intruder in the church. He ate and slept here, gentlemen.”
Mr. Blower said it with a convulsive dramatic gesture and stood with his head on one side awaiting what Littlejohn had to say.
“It certainly looks like an improvised bed, sir. But are you sure it was used last night, and by an intruder?”
“Of course, I am. I was in this loft late last night. There was nobody here then. Nor was there a hassock and a long cushion. Nor any bread-crumbs. Someone must have hidden in church until the verger locked-up. He closed the place as I left. I had been busy on my new Blower in B.”
“Is this a place where anybody accidentally locked-in might sleep?”
“Yes. It is more comfortable here than anywhere else. It is warm, because there are no draughts, as in the nave or vestries.”
Death in the Fearful Night (An Inspector Littlejohn Mystery) Page 10
